Author's Note: I do not own ANYTHING pertaining to Kingdom Hearts. I only own Blastbone Clarkson, Charlotte Amaturie (to appear in later chapters), and their nobodies. Also, sorry for the slightly late update. I am trying to release a chapter every Friday or so, and I kinda got side-tracked last week. So, without further ado, here's:

Chapter V: Radiant Garden

Blaster smiled as he lit the fasten seatbelt light a good 30 seconds before he planned to drop out of hyperspace. He was glad that every station was manned, so he didn't have to fly his ship all by himself. Kairi took her seat by the communications console, messaging ahead to Radiant Garden to let them know that they were coming. Blaster would have let Sora drive, but Sora had a bad start to his ship piloting skills, so Blaster put him over by Kairi to man one of the many manual weapons on the ship. Riku also manned one of the manual weapons, on the other side of the bridge from Sora. Nox had a spot on the radar, leaving Xarch to look at defensive capabilities. Donald and Goofy, who pretty much had nothing to do, just went to two more manual weaponry stations. Blaster, as always, had himself in his chair, right in front of the pilot controls.

The Pegasus lurched out of hyperspace over top of Radiant Garden. Below the ship, the majestic gardens the world was once known for were back, and most of the buildings were rebuilt. The Bailey was still heavily damaged, but the section that was leaning over the makeshift route heading towards the Great Maw was slowly being repaired. Blaster was able to pick out the landing pad for Gummi Ships easily, touching down to face the castle that was once home to Ansem the Wise. Pegasus's engines wound down slowly as Blaster signaled for everyone to remove their seatbelts.

"Alright, folks," Blaster said, as every one turned to face him. "We will be taking the long way out, so follow me and try not to get lost."

Nox, Xarch, and Riku all rolled their eyes, but took up a line behind Blaster, Sora, Kairi, Donald, and Goofy. Blaster walked the group out of the bridge through the back, and down the hall to the left into an elevator that took them down five floors to the lowest level. Then it was just a simple airlock across from the elevator that led to the outside. Once out the airlock door, which didn't need to be pressurized because they were on the ground, the group met up with Leon, Yuffie, and Merlin.

"Greetings," Merlin said. "My, my, it has been a long time since I've seen you, Blaster. Weren't you heading back home?"

"Yeah, I would have, but I felt I was going to be needed again," the alien replied. "We came with friends."

"YOU TWO!" Leon shouted, withdrawing his gunblade. Nox and Xarch, who were just about to be introduced, suddenly cowered behind Blaster and Riku.

"You know these guys?" Sora asked.

"Unfortunately, yes," Leon replied.

"Before we remembered you again, these two would come in and start terrorizing the town," Yuffie explained. "That's why one of the first things we did after we reclaimed this place was activating the town's defense system. Luckily, these two turned their attention to Maleficent's castle."

"That was before," Nox said, poking his head out from behind Blaster. "Times change, and some people have a change of heart."

"I thought Nobodies didn't have hearts," Merlin said.

"Well, that ended up being a bit of a stretch," Xarch said. "I would go into details, but now might not be the time. We are one of the good guys now. I am sorry about what happened in the past, but I would like to tell you that we didn't do anything harmful to the villagers."

"So, where's the rest of the group?" Sora asked eagerly.

"Cid is sitting at the computer in Ansem's study to help defend the town," Yuffie replied, "Tifa went off to her home world, where we believe Cloud ended up after his battle with Sephiroth."

"How's Cloud doing?" Goofy asked.

"Areith had to go over and fix him up, but she thinks he'll make a full recovery," Leon said. "But he hasn't told us yet if he won or not. Must have been a very rough fight in order to get so badly injured"

"Okay," Blaster said. "Well, as you are probably aware, we are here to find out all about the Chasers. I believe there is information on Ansem's computer."

"Then, let's go visit Tron," Donald suggested, running off towards the postern. The rest were quick to follow, but Leon, Yuffie, and Merlin just stood and watched as everyone else ran towards the computer room.

"That was quick," Merlin said. Leon and Yuffie nodded in agreement.

ITFITFITFITFITF

"Well, greetings Users Sora, Donald and Goofy," Tron's voice said. Seconds later his face appeared on one of the monitors. "I see you brought new users with you. Are these Users Riku and Kairi?"

"Yes," Sora said, pointing to the two friends on either side of him. "These are Riku and Kairi. I brought more friends though."

"MORE Users?" Tron asked. "How many Friends have you got?"

"Not enough," Blaster said sarcastically from behind Sora. Tron turned his head to look at the voice, and noticed Blaster. "I'm Blaster, by the way." Blaster then pointed to Nox and Xarch. "And these are friends Noxbastbel and Xarch."

"Welcome, User Blaster," Tron said. "I'm sorry, but Noxbastbel and Xarch are enemies of Radiant Garden."

"We're sorry for what we did," Nox responded. "We were just following orders. We did not wish to harm anyone in this town."

"The fact of the matter is, we had a change of heart," Xarch said. "We will do what we can to make right what we did wrong."

"So, Tron," Sora asked. "Is there any information about the Seekers?"

Tron's face suddenly blanked out as he searched, the blue circuitry lines in his helmet flashing and flaring like mad. After only about 30 seconds, Tron returned to normal.

"There is no data on the Seekers in the main archive," Tron replied. "Would you like me to check the other archives?"

"Please," Blaster said. "If there is nothing there, see if there is anything in the data space."

"You will need the password," Tron said.

"Oh, that's easy," Sora said.

"Oh no," Riku said, burying his face in his hands. "Don't tell me."

"Sora, Donald, Goofy," Blaster replied monotonously.

"Searching in so many different locations will take some time," Tron said. "There is a lot of data I am searching through."

Just then, an explosion rocked the entire castle.

"Take your time," Sora said. "We'll come back after we've checked up on some things."

Blaster quickly ran back out the door and towards where all the commotion was. The rest were quick to follow, and they didn't have to go much further than the Postern to see the cause of the commotion. Blaster skidded to a stop, and was about to take a step back when Sora, who wasn't paying attention, ran into Blaster, causing him to fall over, and the rest of the group to pile on top of them.

"Blaster," Sora said, trying to claw his way out of the dogpile. "Next time, warn us before you come to an abrupt stop."

"Sorry guys," Blaster said as everyone untangled themselves. Blaster was barely up when he noticed that the reason he had stopped was looking at him.

Right in the middle of the postern, from where he had been throwing explosive balls of fire, was a man dressed in a red colored suit of armor. On either side of the helmet were tall fins that ended in what looked like metallic representations of flames. The visor seemed to be opaque, but Blaster deduced that it was only tinted, because no one would be able to see out of that.

"Looks like we got us a Seeker," Blaster said, summoning the Thirteen Order Crystal to his grasp. The rest were soon to follow. The Seeker turned around at Blaster's remark

"Well," The Red Seeker said in an oily voice. He summoned a Keyblade into his hand that looked like a standard sword. "Looks like we have a few Keyblade wielders. And by the looks of it, it's Sora, Riku, Blaster of Earth, and Kairi, Princess of Heart. Oh, this is a most glorious day." The Seeker pointed his Keyblade at Blaster, then changed his voice to a more threatening one. "Give me your blades or die."

"Hand over Keyblade or die," Blaster said, stroking his chin as he twirled his keyblade. "I'm going to have to pass on both."

"Then you will die right here, right now," the Seeker replied, charging so fast that Blaster barely had time to dodge the strike. The Seeker slamed his keyblade into the ground, missing Blaster by a few inches, and then approached the alien keyblader angrily. Blaster started a mini celebration a bit too early, but was wise enough to stop as soon as the Seeker's blade, Sword of Justice, swung towards his head. Blaster narrowly avoided the strike and countered with his own strike.

"Get him, Blaster!" Sora shouted. What Blaster didn't know was that both he and the Chaser were within one of those barriers. Sora was cheering Blaster on until the Seeker looked in his direction, then pointed. "What are you pointing at?"

"HEARTLESS!" Riku shouted, summoning The Way to the Dawn, back to Sora.

"Where did they come from?" Kairi asked, Island Memories materializing in her grasp.

Sora turned around and saw what looked like a small army of heartless began to emerge from pools of inky darkness, and each one being the measly Solder or Shadow. Riku had his blade at the ready, holding it almost above his head and pointed at the Heartless. Kairi held her blade differently, holding it with two hands in front of her, much like Cloud and Leon held their weapons. Donald and Goofy had their weapons out, and were awaiting the first attack. Nox and Xarch had truly remarkable weapon choices. Nox held his chain whip slightly off to the side, the chain extending out behind him. Xarch pulled out her katanas, which turned out to be very similar versions of the Aerial Blades Xemnas used. One blade was red, while the other was blue.

"Here they come," Donald shouted, shooting ice out of his Save the Queen+ at the nearest heartless. The Shadow he was aiming for jumped up at the last second, aiming to tackle Kairi. Kairi took a quick one handed swipe at the shadow, causing it to burst into black dust. Sora jumped out from behind Kairi, and swung, summoning the Ultima Weapon and slicing through three Shadows and a solder in one swipe. Riku overtook Sora and sliced through five Shadows at once before blasting away another one with Dark Firaga. Nox wasn't having any problem with his chain whip. One second it was flying through the air and striking down Heartless, then the blade-ended handle met another behind him.

While Nox seemed to be like a one man army, Xarch was a one (wo)man army, destroying Heartless with every turn of her wrist. Both blades extended on command, destroying anything that got in their path. Goofy on the other hand was just throwing his Save the King+ shield like a boomerang. But, with every Heartless that was destroyed, two more appeared in its spot.

"I'm starting to not like the look of this," Sora said, backing up to Riku.

"Then, what are we waiting for?" Riku said, turning to Sora, his blade at the ready.

Sora just nodded. The air was tense around the two as heartless surrounded them, this time joined by a few Large Bodies, and a Morning Star or two.

"Riku!" Sora suddenly shouted.

"I'll take 'em!" Riku called.

Instantly, the two friends launched at the heartless, slashing relentlessly and destroying one of the Large Bodies with a single slash. About 20 were destroyed in the initial blast, but that didn't put a large dent in anything.

"Is that all you got?" Riku taunted as he spun, in midair, around Sora. They aimed their next attack towards the direction of Kairi, who was in her Valor Form, Donald and Goofy, all of whom were against the wall. More heartless were destroyed as Dark Firaga erupted from the fingertips of the duo. As if that wasn't enough, the heartless that were just too close to the trio were destroyed by a few quick slashes.

"Out of my way!" Riku called as he and Sora passed Kairi, Donald, and Goofy. Their next targets were right near the barrier separating the Red Seeker and Blaster from the fight (the fights will continue next chapter), where Nox and Xarch were having a little bit of trouble. Riku and Sora combined blades to make one large, dark-blue blade. Riku took the blade in one hand, and swung so hard that it landed right in Sora's hands. Sora returned the blade, each slice destroying many heartless. Sora then summoned thirteen golden-colored blades of light. Each blade turned horizontal, and spun around the two friends like a circular saw blade, slicing through heartless like they were air. The two alternated attacks until they were the ones in trouble (which is hard to imagine)

"You're gonna lose it all!" Riku shouted, tossing his Keyblade into the air. Sora tossed his into the air too, and the hovered about 10 feet from each other, 20 feet from the ground, tips pointing at each other . Riku's blade suddenly began to emit darkness, while Sora's began to emit light. The two then drew in power, with a black half-sphere around Riku's blade, and a blue half-sphere around Sora's, both meeting at the top of the sphere in a ball of light, sucking heartless in. Every heartless in the vicinity were instantly swallowed into the vortex as the light grew until it "exploded" and destroyed over 100 heartless in the blast.

"Riku!" Sora called.

"Time's up!" Riku replied, retrieving his keyblade and pounding Sora's fist. The two turned around and saw most of the heartless were being replaced.

"Where the heck are these guys coming from?" Kairi asked, slicing both her blades through three heartless.

"I dunno," Goofy said, watching as Sora transformed into his Master form.

"What I do know is that Blaster must be having a tough time," Nox said, looking at his counterpart before returning to battle. A LONG battle.

(Scenes from the next chapter.)

ON THE NEXT "INTO THE FIRE": In the face of battle, (Blaster and the Fire Seeker had their blades locked, both of them struggling to get the upper hand) you don't have time to think about your moves (Blaster flew by the Fire Seeker, performing his Flash move (which is similar to Sephiroth's flash attack, but his is 13, Blaster's is 21). And it's always nice to know who you are fighting ("It's…" the Seeker said.). Into the Fire. Next Friday at 9/8c.

So, tell me, do any of you like the extended chapters like this, or did you like the original format (which ended up being roughly 4 pages on Word for me)

VIRTUAL JOURNAL:

SQUALL (LEON) LEONHART: A skilled swordsman who wields a Gunblade. His real name is Squall Leonhart, but he took the name of Leon to distance himself from his past: the man who was helpless as the Heartless invaded Radiant Gardens. Along with Cid, Aerith, Yuffie, and Merlin, he is helping to restore Radiant Gardens to their former grandeur. He first appeared in Final Fantasy VIII (1999).

YUFFIE: A member of the now Radiant Gardens Restoration Committee, she is a very high-spirited, self proclaimed "great" ninja. She was able to return to her home over a year ago when Sora sealed the then Hollow Bastion keyhole. Since then, she's been helping out to restore the town to what it used to be. She made her appearance in Final Fantasy VII (1997).

MERLIN: A Powerful wizard living in Radiant Gardens. His house has been turned into the base of operations for the Restoration Committee, but that could change once the castle is in working order again. As a wizard, Merlin was able to train Sora in the art of magic. His magic is assumed to be "on par" with fellow wizard Yen Sid. One of the most interesting magical items he has is a bag that can hold anything, regardless of size. He appeared first in The Sword and the Stone (1963).

TRON: A security program that was augmented by Ansem the Wise. He is responsible for the Radiant Garden Defense System, and overall defense of the computer system stored in Ansem's secret lab. The Master Control Program (MCP) wanted to take control away from the users, but was stopped by Tron and Sora. He defended the computer in Tron (1982).

RED SEEKER: One of the three remaining Seekers in the universe. It is unknown if he has a name, or what his purpose is. Based on the fire-like fins on his helmet, it is safe to say that he controls fire.

Riku: Session. An attack where the two Keyblade Masters fly around, destroying everything that gets in their path.